Des Houghton: Why Annastacia Palaszczuk won’t last the new year

OPINION: The Premier is suffering the third-term blues. Her credibility is shot, and she is likely to be replaced in the new year, writes Des Houghton.

• Kylie Lang: Team Too-Little-Too-Late still bumbling after all these years

This will come to be remembered as the year the Queensland Labor Party blew it. It was the year the Palaszczuk government poisoned the political ecosystem and caused pain to innocent bystanders.

When the Premier wasn’t gallivanting on the red carpet, she was frantically covering up one scandal after another.

The year ended on a tragic note with the alleged stabbing murder of Emma Lovell by teenage home invaders, one of whom was out on bail. Palaszczuk was forced to defend her government’s softening of juvenile justice laws.

Labor was especially shamed by failures in Queensland Health.

An enduring memory for me will be a story in the Gold Coast Bulletin about an 89-year-old great-grandmother who waited 7½ hours for an ambulance after falling in her kitchen and breaking her hip and leg.

Shirley Prestipino had to lie on the floor like a wounded animal, her daughter Tina Barber told the paper.

Inept Health Minister Yvette D’Ath was caviller and unconvincing in pretending long waits for emergency care was the new normal.

In a “bombshell” parliamentary hearing, the Opposition successfully pressed bureaucrats into admitting that Queenslanders were waiting up to 15 hours in overcrowded emergency departments.

The LNP also calculated that Queensland’s ambulance crisis was the worst in the country, with more than one in three ambulances routinely ramped outside hospitals.

Ministerial documents D’Ath kept hidden showed ramping was getting worse despite record federal hospital funding. A Right to Information search by the LNP revealed patients were waiting longer in the back of ambulances stuck outside hospitals, despite there being thousands fewer call-outs than the previous year.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk

D’Ath’s veracity was also under question. The RTI showed the Labor government did not once meet its Code 1A response time target in a three-month period, despite the Health Minister saying these targets were being met. Between June and September, paramedics and patients were ramped for close to 40,000 hours. The worst hospitals for ramping were Logan, Ipswich, PA and QEII.

A patient suffering severe abdominal pain and vomiting died after waiting 9hr 19min for an ambulance. An aged care resident who fell died after an ambulance took more than three hours to arrive, while a woman threatening self-harm took her own life after an ambulance delay of more than two hours.

The year ends with Queensland’s forensic laboratory in a terrible mess. Botched DNA testing saw murderers and rapists go free. An inquiry by Walter Sofronoff KC found the Queensland Health lab was run by a prolific liar who mishandled evidence and compromised thousands of cases.

The failures in the DNA tests have serious ramifications for the criminal justice system. Sofronoff, a retired Supreme Court judge, was “astounded” by what was uncovered and said the failings were “as big as it gets”.

He found several scientists employed at the lab had been clamouring for years about a dangerous lack of scientific integrity. As usual when bad news comes to the surface, the government was slow to act.

A low point in Labor’s political year came with revelations in parliament of interference in the independent watchdog groups. Ousted state archivist Mike Summerell said the government was “toxic”, with parliament misled and reports falsified to hide “bad news”.

Former integrity commissioner Nikola Stepanov had her staff slashed to one person with no legal training while she investigated alleged illegal lobbying. Her computer system was so old it lacked the capacity to update files relating to lobbying. Stepanov’s laptop was seized and the contents “deleted without my knowledge or consent”. In other evidence, she told the House she was referred to as “bitch on a witch hunt”.

Treasurer Cameron Dick

Former legal services commissioner Bob Brittan called for a far-reaching inquiry, saying he was bewildered that ethical issues he raised were ignored. Auditor-General Brendan Worrall advocated law changes to bolster his independence amid concerns the state government holds too much power over his office.

There is much unfinished business. Parliament heard Logan city councillors had been involved in a “travesty of justice”. The councillors were forced out of office and unable to run again after charges were made against them that were later found to be unsubstantiated. They are suing. Also charged and thereby ineligible for re-election was Moreton Bay mayor Allan Sutherland. Charges against him were dropped.

Jonathan Horton (then) QC told the parliamentary inquiry that CCC chairman Alan MacSporran had not ensured the CCC acted impartially, independently, and fairly at all times in the Logan case. MacSporran’s appointment was terminated.

We also learned this year that Annastacia Palaszczuk has a tin ear, embarking on a jolly social life at taxpayer expense while middle-aged mortgage men and women were at home tightening the belt.

At the hands of her government, few were spared extra taxes and charges. Learner drivers are forced to pay $186.55 for their licence – seven times more than southern states.

And now resource companies are abandoning Queensland as a direct result of a controversial new royalties scheme introduced by Treasurer Cameron Dick. With Dick at the helm, service has never been worse while debt has never been higher.

Meanwhile, some are still not willing to forgive Palaszczuk for milking Covid-19 for political gain, extending lockdowns at great harm to families and small business.

Peter Beattie was chastised for saying so, but he was right when he said Palaszczuk should be grooming a successor. While she is happy to take the spotlight for good news announcements, she quickly retreats to the shadows when bad news arrives.

I’m convinced she will not survive another year.

Health Minister Yvette D’Ath

IRRITANT OF THE YEAR

Health Minister Yvette D’Ath won by a furlong.

Under her watch Queensland Health was embroiled in a series of monumental hospital and ambulance service failures that threatened Queenslanders’ lives.

The department also has a poor work culture where bullying is rife.

D’Ath’s personal integrity was also under scrutiny. She also ignored Westminster tradition by failing to stand aside pending investigations into a free storage gift from her Moreton Bay friend Marlene Newcombe, who won a lucrative health department contract.